Revision Notes Class 10th History: Chapter 5 Print Culture and the Modern World

Print Culture and the Modern World

Summary

• The earliest kind of print technology was developed in China, Japan and Korea. This was a system of hand printing.
• Books in China were printed by rubbing paper against the inked surface of wooden blocks.
• China was the major producer of printed materials.
• The skilled craftsmen could duplicate, with remarkable accuracy, the different style of writing called calligraphy.
• Shanghai was the hub of the new print culture.
• The oldest printed book known is a Japanese Buddhist book, the Diamond Sutra printed in AD 868.
• In medieval Japan, poets and prose writers were regularly published and books were cheap and abundant.
• In the late 18th century, at Edo, illustrated collections of paintings depicted an elite urban culture.
• For centuries, silk and spices from China flowed into Europe through the silk route.
• In the 11th century, Chinese paper reached Europe through the silk route.
• Gutenberg, son of a merchant, mastered printing technique by 1448. First book he printed was the Bible. It took him 3 years to print 180 copies.
• One hundred eighty copies of this book were printed in three years.
• Printed books at first closely resembled the written manuscripts in appearance and layout.
• Luxury editions were still written by hand on very expensive ‘Vellum’ meant for aristocratic circles.
• The print revolution transformed the lives of people.
• In 1517, the religious reformer Martin Luther wrote ‘Ninety Five Theses’ criticising the Catholic Church.
• Printing helped to spread the new ideas of Reformation.
• The Roman Church imposed severe controls over publishers and booksellers.
• In England, penny chapbooks were carried, by petty peddlers known as chapmen sold for a penny.
• In France, small chapbooks called the ‘Biliotheque Bleue’ were sold at low-price.
• The periodical press, newspapers and journals carried information about wars and trade, as well as news of development in other places.
• The ideas and writings of the scientists like Isaac Newton, Thomas Paine, Voltaire and Jean Jacques Rousseau were printed and read.
• The French Revolution occurred as printing helped the spread of ideas.
• Primary education became compulsory from the late 19th century; children became an important category of readers.
• A children’s press, devoted to literature for children was set up in France in 1857.
• Penny magazines were specially meant for women.
• The best known novelists were Jane Austen, the Bronte Sisters and George Eliot.
• In the 19th century, libraries in England became instruments for educating the factory workers, artisans and lower middle-class people.
• Self-educated working class people wrote political tracts and autobiographies.
• By the late 18th century, the press came to be made out of metal.
• Richard M. Hoe of New York made the power driven cylindrical press, which was capable of printing 8,000 sheets per hour. This press was used for printing newspapers.
• In the late 19th century, the offset press was developed.
• In 1930s, publishers brought out cheap paperback editions.
• Printers and publishers continuously developed new strategies to sell their product. In the 1920s in England, popular works were sold in cheap series, called the Shilling series.
• India had a very rich and old tradition of hand written manuscripts in Sanskrit, Arabic and Persian as well as in various vernacular languages.
• In India, manuscripts were copied on palm leaves and on hand made paper.
• In 1710, Dutch missionaries had printed 32 Tamil texts.
• From 1780, James August Hickey began to edit the ‘Bengal Gazette’, a weekly magazine.
• By the close of the 18th century, printing of many newspapers and journals started.
• In the early 19th century, there were intense debates around existing religious issues.
• Some groups wanted reforms, while others were against them.
• This was a time of intense controversies between social and religious reforms.
• The reformers were focused on the Hindu orthodoxy over matters like widow immolation, monotheism, Brahmanical priesthood and idolatry.
• Many newspapers such as “Sambad Kaumudi” in 1821 (by Ram Mohan Roy) “Samachar Chandrika” (Hindu Orthodoxy), “Jam-i-Jahan Nama” and “Shamsul Akbar” from 1822 Persian newspaper) focused on this matter.
• In North India, the ‘Ulama’ used lithographic presses, published Persian and Urdu translation of Holy Scriptures, and printed religious newspapers and tracts to spread their religion.
• In 1867, Deoband seminary was founded which published thousands of ‘Fatwas’ telling the code of conduct of Muslims and explaining the meanings of doctrines.
• Print encouraged the reading of religious texts, especially in the vernacular languages.
• The first printed edition of the Ramcharitmanas came out from Calcutta in 1810.
• Naval Kishore Press at Lucknow and the Shri Venkateshwar Press in Bombay published numerous religious texts in vernaculars.
• At the end of the 19th century, a new visual culture was started.
  Painters like Raja Ravi Verma produced images for mass circulation.
• Cheap prints and calendars were easily available in the market.
• By the 1870’s, caricatures and cartoons were being published in journals and newspapers.
• In 1860, few Bengali women like Kailashbashini Debi wrote books highlighting the experiences of women.
• Hindi printing began from the 1870s.
• In Punjab, folk literature was printed from the early 20th century.
• In Bengal, the Battala was devoted to the printings of popular books; peddlers took the Battala publications to homes, enabling women to read in leisure time.
• Public libraries were set up in the early 20th century.
• Local protest movements created a lot of popular journals.
• After the revolt of 1857, the attitude to freedom of the press changed.
• In 1878, the Vernacular Press Act was passed.
• In 1907, Bal Gangadhar Tilak wrote with great sympathy about Punjab revolution in his “Kesari”. This led to his imprisonment in 1908.